and it suddenly arrived... plugged it in and immediately noticed wider and taller soundstage - super obvious on the Glenn Gould Goldberg Variation I was streaming on Tidal. gonna let it run for a day or two before further assessment.
You guys have me intrigued I have a similar device the High Fidelity MC-0.5 plugged into my system, a friend had 3 of them and loaned me one to try for a month so it was a no risk purchase. It gave the sound a more relaxed quality I know that's hard to define but best way for me to describe it. My power cords are Furutech and I like the quality of their stuff definitely considering it.
so far i would describe it as it brings a sense of calm... possibly due to lower noise floor and wider/taller/deeper soundstage
Not good enough for a real result (sample size too small) but better than most people's claim of "it's so obvious it doesn't need a blind test." Even though it's not double blind and not a large enough sample size, your post has me shopping one of these little miracle devices. Still, with a device as controversial as this, it would really be nice if someone took the time and effort to prove a difference with a true ABX test with a large sample size. Everyone reading this thread has already had their judgement clouded with expectation bias that invalidates any sighted listening testing.
As has been mentioned before the Furutech gets better with some burn in. I now have solid and pretty much constant imaging to the side walls of my room which are 3' away on the left on 4' on the right. Before the addition of the clear line this would only occasionally happen with well recorded albums. It's also now imaging up the sidewalls 8' to the front. Yes I had to get out the tape measure for that one while I was shaking my head in disbelief. That type of forward imaging has never happened until this weekend (Joe Bonamassa-Live at Royal Albert Hall. I honestly do not know how much better the sound can get but I am now casually looking to add another clear line or 2. Supply issues has me concerned about shipping from Japan so I'll probably hold off for a while. They may or may not work as well on everyone's rig but my ears tell me it's made and continues to make a remarkable difference on mine.
Notice how the benefits claimed to be caused by AC power-related upgrades (power conditioners, cables, fuses. etc.), such as an "immediately noticed wider and taller soundstage", "it gave the sound a more relaxed quality", "it brings a sense of calm", etc. never correspond to any objectively measurable specifications. Statements like these that are impossible to prove are also very conveniently impossible to disprove.
100% valid statement imo. However similar to motorstereo, when I was plugging the NCF in I was up beside one of the speakers which it was on a piano solo track that had repetition through out and it was pretty obvious right there (calmness) for all of the piano notes that was being played - I was also moving the plug between different slots for a more visual pleasing look and every time it came out the sound was different to when it was in. Then I sat back into the same chair I left to plug it in and it was pretty apparent - I have the speakers set up for near field and the sound stage never went much beyond the width of the speaker placement but after the NCF was plugged in, it was apparent that it extended beyond both speakers. I'm was also pretty skeptical as well and have always been for cables, tweaks and stuff. The only two cables I have that is not stock is for my dac and stream - one didn't come with one and the other was a wall wart that made it tricky to plug in behind the rack. Rca and speakers I'm using the commonly available stuff (e.g. mogami).
Why don't you prove it to yourself and try one out? If you don't like it, send it back. All for $250. Lol. That's as inexpensive as it gets in the world of hi end audio. Then, you can provide us with the objective measurements that you desire.
Same here...was originally looking at the Furutech NCF duplex outlet, and stumbled onto this thread. Followed up by reading all the online reviews. Glad to have one on the way to sit in my standard outlet alongside my power conditioner. If it does what you all report, I will eventually upgrade the outlet itself as I'd planned, and probably put the Clear Line in the conditioner itself. As this is as simple plug-and-play as it gets, it's a relatively small outlay of time and energy to see what it can do for my system. Will report back like the rest of you!
Because if I actually did have AC power "dirty" enough to negatively affect the performance of my stereo system, I'd call an electrician, not an audio dealer, because it could be a sign of a potentially dangerous electrical fault. Thankfully, I am a SWL and AM radio DXer, which is the canary in the coal mine in terms of catching any such faults long before they get to that point. When you're trying to listen to the 0.1 millivolt signal from your moving coil phono cartridge from a few feet away, I'm trying to listen to a 0.1 microvolt radio signal from thousands of miles away. Electromagnetic noise being radiated through the AC power system is a huge bugbear in this hobby, and no magic $250 box is going to fix it when it's actually coming from an arcing power line down the street or a neighbor who's using a plasma TV set (those things cause an enormous amount of RFI).
Correct; This is a passive device that does not remove any emi as I mentioned earlier. That's what dedicated lines and a good quality pc is for and will do. I look at both the Furutech products I currently use as steps up in the refinement process of gaining better sound even though there are no problems in my rig that I'm aware of.
Isn't that like buying a can of elephant repellant, and then claiming it works because you've never seen an elephant?
No one said that this product is going to fix those electrical issues which you speak of. Quite honestly, I don't know what it's doing (outside of the company's literature) OR how it's doing it. THAT IT DOES POSITIVELY change the sound of my system, THAT I am most sure of, as are ALL the others on this thread who have actually tried one in their systems. Frankly, I'm astonished at the number of respondents who have stated that this product did indeed positively change the sound as I stated in my initial post. I thought it may just have been my system allowing such a clear difference to be heard with the NCF in and then out of the outlet. Just don't tell me that "no magic $250 box " is going to make a change. IT DID. Not only on mine but EVERYONE on this forum who tried it. You're implying that we are all hearing things that aren't really there when you say "magic" in the context that you used it in. Yes indeed, I have muttered many times since installing it "What black magic is going on? How can I be hearing what I'm hearing by simply plugging in this little device?" All I can say is to use your ears and listen.
Well you've spotted the problem, we're reliant on our senses when it comes to our system producing 'music', a measurable difference gets us nowhere, as the only way to 'prove' it's relevant is to listen. With that in mind I've bought one, on a 30 day return basis, I'll feed back my experience once it's arrives.
I never argued that the claim improvements aren't audible. I just stated the fact that they aren't objectively measurable. If people were claiming that it lowered the noise floor, flattened the frequency response, and/or reduced distortion, anyone with a signal generator and oscilloscope would be able to easily verify or refute those claims. But "it gave the sound a more relaxed quality" and "it brings a sense of calm" won't show up on any measurement device I know of, except maybe the thing Scientologists use to do their audits.
So I guess what you are saying is that there are some things in audio that our ears detect, but are not, as of yet, measurable. I believe that very same thing.
Not necessarily only through the ears. Listening to music is also a tactile, visual, psychological, and emotional experience.